A Love Letter To (And Defense of) Picture Book Biographies

Over at Electric Lit, J.M. Farkas writes "You Should Be Getting Your Biographies in Children’s Picture Book Form"

Highlights:

“Reading PBBs is an amazing hack for readers who want to know the general beats of notable lives.... But beyond acquiring facts and increasing your Jeopardy! score*, what I relish most about PBBs is how they infuse history with much-needed empathy and emotion.”

“There’s also one more hidden benefit: reading them will make you a better writer. A biography in a picture book format is a master class in distillation. All writing involves making choices, sometimes excruciating choices, of what to leave in and what to leave out—but the art of a biographer takes this excision to the next level. And the scissory task of a picture book biographer is even more arduous: how to fit an entire life into a 32-page container. It’s no coincidence that some of the best PBBs have the fewest words.”

And then the author lists some of their favorite picture book biographies. Some I knew, others I've added to my to-be-read list.

The whole piece is well-worth reading!

Illustrate and Write On,
Lee

*For a fun sidebar, see the shout out that 'Jeopardy!' Star James Holzhauer gave to children's books as his strategy to become a game show millionaire.